TIMP3 and neoplasm: We found that in >85% of all gastric cancer tissues, the TIMP3 gene 5′ CpG island exhibited aberrant methylation that was significantly higher (P < 0.01) than that of the normal gastric tissue group, which implied that TIMP3 gene promoter CpG island methylation reduced TIMP3 gene expression and was thus the main tumor suppressor-inactivation mechanism in gastric cancer.